Childhood and Other Things That Hurt You
by esplanade
Summary: "People always think of a sunrise as a timed event that you can pinpoint to the second, when the reality is that it is a slow progression from darkness to light."


A/N: For piningjohn on Tumblr, based on her headcanon.

* * *

The layover was never supposed to happen, and it put them in Athens far later than originally intended. There was no day of quiet adjustment or sightseeing before meeting the client the following morning. Instead there was exhaustion and late check-ins and luggage dropped indifferently on the beds and floor of the hotel room.

John made many remarks throughout the ordeal about wanting nothing more than to fall into a deep sleep wherever he could find a place to do so, but the reality was that he was wide awake, despite the overwhelming ache coursing through his body.

Sherlock never slept on trips like this. John didn't know why they even bothered getting two beds in a room, since one always went unused. To keep people from getting the wrong idea, he told himself. Wouldn't want to give anyone the wrong idea.

Neither of them had ever been in Athens, never had a reason to be, and while John could manage some intellectual interest even as tired as he was, Sherlock seemed to not care at all that the Acropolis itself could be seen from their balcony. But then again, why _would_ Sherlock care about it? He would likely call it a broken relic. And that may have been true, but it was still beautiful, bathed in light, staring down at the city.

"Pass me that bag, would you?" Sherlock blindly reached out to grab it as he stared at his phone in his other hand. He swung his arm around to John. John reached for it just as blindly, and brushed Sherlock's fingers with his own when he took it. Cold, always so cold. Sherlock didn't notice, never did when things like that happened, and he crossed the room, throwing open the doors and stepping out onto the balcony, muttering about reception. "Room service, or are you planning on venturing out?"

"Busy."

Nothing but silence and the scrape of the room service menu on the bedside table.

Always so cold.

... ... ...

Middle of the night, and a room that felt like an oven from the open balcony doors. John hadn't even tried to sleep, really, and none of his usual distractions were worth much in the heat and the glow of city lights. Sherlock had given up getting what he wanted from his phone, and had been reduced to smoking while pacing the balcony. John had chided him at first, _not supposed to be smoking_, but Sherlock had ignored him. Unsurprising.

Who knew what time it was when John finally ventured out to the balcony, sitting in the free chair across Sherlock, the smallest of tables between them, on which sat Sherlock's phone, as if it had been placed in time-out for its behavior earlier. Sherlock had settled down as the evening progressed, falling into one of his periods of lassitude, resulting in him staring off into space, smoke curling up from the most recent cigarette trapped between his fingertips. He may as well have been a work of art, a breeze grabbing at his hair, his face softly lit, the technicolor world of Athens as his backdrop.

John's scotch wasn't nearly strong enough, but it would have to do.

"I hate this," he said, his voice not as strong as he believed it would be.

"And what is _this_, exactly?" Sherlock didn't even turn to look at him.

"Well, you never sleep, but I didn't exactly want to be awake all night. Why are we taking this case again?"

"Mycroft." An irritated flick of the cigarette over the ashtray, a little smoldering piece of paper falling.

"One of these days I'm going to tell your brother to go to hell."

"I won't stop you." Finally, a smile, a glance.

"What are we going to do with the rest of the night? We don't have to meet the client till ten in the morning."

He shrugged. "Tell a story," he said, not entirely sarcastically.

"A story?"

"That's what you do, isn't it? On your blog? You're a doctor, but what you actually do for a living is tell stories."

"We haven't met the client yet. No story to tell."

"Then stretch your imagination. Either that or learn to speak Greek so you can watch something on television."

No speech, not for a long time. Just the baked white stone barrier between them and the world, the sound of the ashtray's metallic little clinking on the table as Sherlock tapped his cigarette too roughly against it. The heat should have felt oppressive, should have smothered them both and crushed words and thoughts alike, but it didn't. It was insulation. It was peace.

Somewhere off in the streets, a car horn blared, the sound ricocheting off the buildings. John let the noise fade to nothing, not wanting to interrupt. He stared absently at his scotch, looking at the way the color didn't seem right when removed from the artificial light indoors, darker and somehow threatening. Ridiculous.

"When Harry was eighteen, she staged a coming out because she wanted to openly date Clara. Neither of our parents had known about Clara, and she'd only told me one night, late, after she'd come home drunk from a party. She was already quite the drinker by eighteen. But Harry invited me down to the living room too, to keep up the pretense. It didn't go well. It ended up being this huge fight, and all I could do was sit there and not say anything, because I didn't want them to be angry with me too, for keeping it a secret as long as I had. She made the mistake of telling our mother late in the evening, when she'd already gone through a lot of whiskey – that's probably where Harry got the habit – and when Harry put her foot in her mouth, like always, our mother threw her glass at her. It missed, didn't hit her or anything, but the glass shattered behind her when it hit the wall, and she screamed because she was so surprised. I wanted to intervene, but I didn't know what to do. It wasn't long after that that she kicked Harry out entirely. I remember the look Harry gave me, when she turned to leave. She looked like I had betrayed her by not saying anything, not standing up for her. That's why Harry was in such bad shape when she split up with Clara. When she was kicked out, the two of them moved in together, and they were very happy for a long time. Harry made it a point to let our mother know how happy they were. So when they split, she felt like it was something she couldn't stop from happening, because our mother had told her that there was no way something like her and Clara could last."

John knew Sherlock was watching him before he even looked up from his glass. Of all the stories he could have told, he didn't know why he'd chosen that one, but he was beginning to regret doing so, seeing the expression of detached concentration on Sherlock's face. His cigarette had gone out entirely, untouched for too long. Seemingly reluctant to look away, Sherlock pulled out his lighter to relight it while he considered what John had said. The snap of it, the single bright little flame flashing across his face in wavering shadows for just a moment before it was extinguished, replaced by the glow of the tip of the cigarette as he inhaled.

"Mycroft told our parents," he said finally.

"What do you mean?"

"About me. Unlike you, my brother could not keep secrets from our parents, nor did he care to or make any effort to do so."

"You mean you actually told your brother something like that about yourself?"

"Of course not. He deduced it. Always was a bit better at deductions than me." He said this with far more irritation and bitterness than he had given his previous remarks. "He was feeling vindictive one day. We were still young, and I had been grating on his nerves all week. Although announcing it at dinner was rather juvenile of him. Blessedly, our parents were unfazed, unlike yours. I can't help but take some pleasure in the fact that Mycroft didn't get the reaction he was expecting. I think he was at least hoping to embarrass me for a few minutes. Instead it was actually a relatively nice dinner. Surprisingly little bickering."

Sherlock was never one to discuss himself in any capacity, preferring to remain solidly in the present while disregarding much of his own past. He certainly wasn't one to share something so private, but he did so with the usual air of neutrality, stating facts, not telling a story.

"Did it bother you, though? What Mycroft did?"

"Not particularly. Does it bother you? What your parents did to your sister?"

John took a drink of his scotch. "Yeah. It still does. That's why we don't talk. I got into a big argument with them about it some years back, among other things. It didn't help the situation."

"I wish Mycroft and I didn't speak sometimes," he said, a small smile on his lips, a joking attitude.

"I know you do."

He gave a small nod, glancing away for a moment. "I suppose everyone has their family secrets and traumas."

"Except people who are unfazed by everything, like you and your family."

"Yes, but the world isn't only family, is it? I can recall all sorts of isolated little terrible events. Sometimes it's the accumulation of such things that kills your good opinion of the universe."

"Like what?"

Another drag on the cigarette, another plume of smoke. "Like seeing some of the other children in your neighborhood torture a dog for sport."

"Seriously?"

"Yes. It was decidedly unpleasant. Human beings are generally awful creatures. But the day to day can be more insidious, and in its own way, just as bad. Being ostracized at school, becoming so used to the word 'freak' as a descriptor that you grow comfortable with it, being used for your skills and otherwise dismissed, not being able to solve the crime or save the victim." Though he spoke as if everything was a string of hypotheticals, it was the closest to admissions that Sherlock had ever come. One tiny flash of very human weakness on his face, that was what finally made John speak.

"You aren't a freak. People who use other people for their skills can go to hell. And even if you can't solve every crime or save every victim, you've done a lot of good for a lot of people, even if you claim you only do it for the sake of solving the puzzle."

"And you couldn't even begin to solve all of the issues within your own family, no matter how vocal you had been. Things that are destined to fall apart will, whether you intervene or not."

"I guess you're right."

"I know I am. People will believe what they want to believe, feel what they want to feel, and act how they want to act. And there's little you can do to change or stop any of it."

"So, what? Just try to do the best we can?"

"That's the general idea, I suppose." Sherlock said nothing else, and John was beginning to think that he had had all he could take of conversation for the night. He was considering going back inside, maybe trying to lie down at least. Sherlock wasn't even looking in his direction anymore. He was staring off at the lit Acropolis. But finally he asked, "Was that the worst day of your life? That incident with Harry and your parents?"

The question gave John a hollow sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. "It's certainly up there. I seemed that way at the time."

"But not the worst day of your life."

"No."

"What beat it?" John didn't answer. He stalled, taking a drink. Every time he tried to speak, he failed. Words were easier here, but some were still poison in his mouth. "You don't have to answer, you know." John was almost startled by the comment, partially due to his own temporary journey into his own thoughts, partially because Sherlock was usually so dogged when pursuing answers to things he wanted to know.

For a while John considered taking him up on that offer. But it wasn't possible. He knew it wasn't. Not here.

"The worst day of my life was shortly after I got back from Afghanistan. I looked at my gun in my desk drawer, and it looked inviting." Sherlock paused, cigarette halfway to his lips. Not quite pity, but something in that area. "Do you know what that's like?"

Sherlock blinked slowly, eyes cutting away from John for a moment before he nodded. "And I hate that you ever had to know it as well." He made a quick little gesture with his hand, motioning for his phone, which had been exiled to John's side of the table. John picked it up and held it out, Sherlock's hand bumping against his as it had earlier that night. Warm, finally, after hours in the heat.

John expected him to begin looking up local papers to see what sort of murders were being investigated, anything of interest, but instead, he just turned it off entirely, something he had never intentionally done in all the time John had known him.

"I may as well save the battery since the reception at this hotel is deplorable," he said, setting the phone back down on the table, the dead screen dull.

Not so cold after all.

... ... ...

"We've covered the most depressing things tonight. What was the happiest day of your childhood?"

"Isn't that a bit trite of a question, John?"

"Probably, but answer it anyway."

"I remember when I was perhaps six or seven, we went on an excursion to a zoo. Mycroft and I got along pretty well that day. It was summer, bright and sunny, uncharacteristic of English weather. It was pleasant."

"A trip to the zoo? Seriously?"

"Yes. I liked the way it was organized. It made sense to me. Everything was neatly categorized by types of species. There was a beautiful rationality to how it was laid out, and as a child you can't help but be struck by how amazing the world is in some regards. So many different creatures all supported by the same stupid planet. I had never seen anything like it."

"What was your favorite exhibit?"

"I rather liked the reptiles. There were so many gorgeous species of snakes. Some other children were there, and they were all terrified of them. I didn't see how anyone could be scared of such extraordinary creatures. There was also a special exhibit there that summer, about bees. I remember thinking that was amazing, and pestering my parents about getting some hives for our yard." John smiled fondly at him, but Sherlock didn't see. "What was yours, then?"

John stared at his glass, running a finger along its rim. "I guess I can't say anything about you and your zoo trip. One of my best memories from when I was a kid was when we started doing science material in school. I had this one teacher who really encouraged your interests, and when we did the unit on the human body, she saw how fascinated I was, and she gave me this big book to take home and read. It had those layers of pages, so you could put the muscles over the bones, the organs in the abdominal cavity, the skin over the entire body, things like that. And I thought it was the most amazing thing I'd ever seen. At the end of the year, she let me just keep the book. I still have it somewhere." Unlike John, Sherlock was not quick enough, and when John looked up from his glass, he saw Sherlock watching him, a quiet sort of soft expression on his face.

It was late, so late, and he hated that there was no way to freeze time.

... ... ...

Hours passed, Sherlock having changed into pajamas and one of his robes, his phone abandoned inside on the bedside table.

"Happiest thing from your teenage years?" John set his glass down on the table, leaning his head against his hand.

"Does anyone really have happy memories of their teenage years?"

John laughed a little under his breath. Always so blunt. "I suppose not. Now that I think of it, I think the happiest memory from my teenage years was the second I quit being a teenager."

"Absolutely. Those years are hellish. I spent most of my efforts escaping them. All the awkward parties and faked social niceties, needless to say, were not for me."

"Needless to say. Okay, adult life, then. Unless it's been too hellish and miserable too?"

Sherlock crushed out his cigarette in the now very full ashtray. It gave one last wisp of smoke before it died entirely, the smell of the tobacco dissipating in the air around them. "No, I can say with full honesty that my adult years have perhaps been the best of my life."

"Why?"

"Oh, a number of reasons. The ability to make my own decisions about my life alone is wonderful. I don't answer to bosses and acquaintances like so many people feel they must. I do what I want for a living. I don't have to expend all my energy on pretending that I enjoy the company of ninety-nine percent of the general population."

"So cheerful, Sherlock. Really, though, best day?"

Sherlock stared at him for a minute. He wanted to say nothing, that was clear enough. But the effect of this place, of this tiny, secluded little Grecian balcony, was far too strong. It had been drawing them out all night. The combination of location and a quiet, still night made it impossible to keep walls up where there should be none.

"I think we both know the answer to that, John." His voice wanted badly to have a smile in it, but he kept his face neutral, unsure what John's reaction would be.

All John could do was smile back at him. It was safe to do that here. It was okay for once to be honest. And as silly as it may have been, it was soothing being able to pretend that the rest of the world didn't exist and that they were in some special type of limbo between real life and the conversations they had played in their heads for so many nights before falling asleep, never said out loud.

"It was my best day, too."

... ... ...

People always think of a sunrise as a timed event that you can pinpoint to the second, when the reality is that it is a slow progression from darkness to light. There is no sudden burst of color in the sky, no instantaneous coming to life of the world. No clear bold lines, but instead, a softened fading. The sunrise crept into Athens as it had for thousands of years. John wasn't sure when he noticed it, the way the light from the hotel room didn't cut so sharply out onto the darker balcony, the muted grayness that always seemed to encapsulate these early morning hours. He couldn't see the sun itself yet, but evidence of its appearance was painted on every building, every tree, every balcony just like theirs up the side of the hotel.

John stood from his chair, his back stiff from lack of movement. He leaned on the edge of the stone, looking out at the Parthenon, the shadows slipping between its white columns. "Should probably try to get _some_ sleep. Have to meet that client in a few hours."

"Seems like an exercise in futility," Sherlock said behind him, his voice laced with the weakest of protests. "I suppose you're correct though."

John turned around, leaning against the wall. Sherlock had been watching him the whole time, unabashedly, making no movement to conceal that fact. Another car horn blaring, echoing off of another building somewhere a few streets over. Early signs of life from the rising Athenians.

Sherlock pushed himself up from his chair, his hands gripping the armrests for a second before he stood. But a combination of no sleep and sitting too long made his eyes glassy, and John reached out instinctively, expecting him to stumble, one hand finding his forearm, one hand finding his hip.

"Stood up too fast," John said to him. Sherlock only nodded before looking up from the thin slice of ground between them. He braced one hand on the wall behind John, more for himself than to keep John from going anywhere, since it was so obvious to him that John wouldn't move.

John let the silence linger, thinking briefly how very much like marble Sherlock could look under the right conditions, carved and severe. But not here, not in early morning light.

It was so easy to bring their lips together. No noise except for distant car engines and rising birds, no sense of time, nothing but these lips pressed together, softly, unhurried. John had always expected this in some great rush of adrenaline, after a case perhaps, both of them breathing hard and fast, pushed to the edge by the thought that they had faced and beaten death again. But this, this still and gentle kiss made John realize suddenly that no, this, _this_ is how it should be.

... ... ...

It had been effortless, leading Sherlock by his hand to their room. John doubted either of them would truly sleep, but the idea of even just lying still seemed refreshing since neither of them would be lying awake alone. John's bag still sat on what would have been his bed. He left it.

With the balcony doors finally closed, the room cooled off quickly, the chilled brush of cotton sheets soft on their hot skin. The sound of the awakening city outside became muffled and distant, background noise to their deep and even breathing. They had maybe three hours before the alarm on John's phone would go off, sending them off to meet the client. John was tempted for a moment to shut his phone off as Sherlock had, to forget the client entirely. In lieu of doing so, he decided to just accept these quiet morning hours.

Neither of them had spoken much, just a word here or there. They had talked so much throughout the night, that now they could afford the silence. A kiss would substitute a sentence, a hand on a cheek a paragraph. They were worthy substitutes.

At first there had been some pretense of personal space, but within ten minutes, they had given up on that as well. The distance, small that it was, felt wrong, and Sherlock let out a contented sigh when John moved closer, his face mere inches away.

Sometime – the minutes all blurred together – Sherlock reached for John's hand, holding it between the two of them, flattening out their fingers so their hands were palm to palm. He kept them like that for a while, John never once moving, and finally he slid their fingers together, running his thumb along John's hand.

When Sherlock looked up at him, he smiled, such a loving turn of expression that John could never understand how anyone ever believed that Sherlock was anything but human. Perfectly, beautifully human.

All John could do was smile back at him, kissing him again just as gently as he had all the times before. The sun was higher in the sky now, cutting through the white curtains, beating down on all the people whose days were beginning. They would go on with their lives, many of them so unaware of all the sunrises. They happened every day, so they would likely be dismissed. But there was no way to dismiss this sunrise, no way to dismiss the lips on his, the quiet brush of skin on sheets.

And even though they had only a few hours, John was sure they would make the best of them.

The rest of the world could wait. It was early, still so early.


End file.
